IBM Vice President, Blockchain Technologies, presented IBM’s point of view to the Commission on Enhancing National Security appointed by President Barack Obama at a recently held hearing in New York City.

Speaking before the panel, Jerry Cuomo emphasized on the rising importance of blockchain technology and its potential to transform commerce and the interactions between governments and individuals.

“Blockchain has inherent qualities that provide trust and security, but, to fulfill its promise, the core technology must be further developed using an open source governance model to make it deployable on a grand scale”, Cuomo said.

He said that government agencies can become early adopters of blockchain applications, adding that government has a crucial role to play in certifying the identities of participants in blockchain-based systems.

IBM has been spearheading blockchain revolution and is playing a pivotal role in the development of a permissioned blockchain. It is a founding member of the Linux Foundation’s open-source HyperLedger Project - a collaborative effort to establish, build and sustain an open, distributed ledger platform that will satisfy a variety of use cases across multiple industries. Cuomo said that IBM is helping to build the foundational elements of business-ready blockchain architecture; with a focus on privacy, confidentiality and auditability.  

“We have joined consortia that are developing industry-specific blockchain implementations. And we’re pioneering the use of blockchain in our own operations”, he added.

Cuomo listed four areas where he believes government, technology companies and industries should work together to advance blockchain to enhance national security: proof of identity, data provenance, secure transaction processing, and sharing intelligence.

He concluded saying: “While government should not seek to control these new financial systems, it has an important role to play in helping them to take off and in safeguarding them. We need to create a new social compact, where business, with input from government, architects the future of financial services. We at IBM look forward to working with our partners in government, industry and academia to get this done.”